Elaboration of the Case Studies

Dear friends and STEPS partners,
As you already know, we are enthusiastically organising the next STEPS Conference in Barcelona, that will take
place at the end of November. One of the central aims of the Conference is the detection of possible reasons
for discrimination of people with learning disabilities. We would suggest taking into account their ordinary
and daily lives. Thus, we will be able to analyse and study, on the basis of the different national backgrounds,
whether or not it is possible to remove obstacles concerning the realisation of participation, self-determination,
and legal and financial equalisation.

In order to deal with these issues during the Barcelona Conference, we would like to suggest to each of the
local partnerships to develop two short case studies, or life reports, taking into account the
guidelines offered below. In other words, you should select real cases within your own community or your local area.
To choose the cases the following criteria could be helpful:

One could be the case of a person who has lived in an institution while he / she was a child and has not been able to develop his / her life inside a family or in a normalised community.
A second case could be that of a person who has been able to live his / her life in a more normalised family context.

One of them should have high needs, being very dependent and unable to make clear decisions.
The second person should have fewer needs, being relatively independent and able to make informed choices.

We would like to suggest concentrating on cases which reflect important problems and obstacles in the field of legal and financial regulations which you would like to overcome.

Please find below a guideline which would be useful to develop the case studies. If you have any questions or doubts please let us know through the Barcelona's group co-ordinator, Xabier Ballesteros.
His e-mail is: xballesteros@mail.bcn.es